Shattuck, Jerry

ORAL HISTORY OF JERRY SHATTUCK
Interviewed by Keith McDaniel
February 2, 2012
MR. MCDANIEL: This is Keith McDaniel and today is February 2nd, 2012 and I am at the home of Jerry Shattuck in Clinton. Jerry, thank you for taking the time to talk to us.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well glad to do it.
MR. MCDANIEL: Jerry, you've been around this area for a long time, so why don't we start with something about you and your background. Tell me something about you, where you were born and raised and your family.
MR. SHATTUCK: Okay, well I was born in Bradford, Pennsylvania, but my family moved down here when I was still an infant. And after a while we moved to Clinton, in 1948. I was about eight years old at that time.
MR. MCDANIEL: Were you?
MR. SHATTUCK: And my father was a heavy equipment sales man and Oak Ridge, the Manhattan Project was part of his territory.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: So, you know growing up, my formulative years, the ‘40’s and the ‘50’s, and went off to college in the late ‘50’s. I grew up very impressed, I can say, in the county that I grew up in.
MR. MCDANIEL: Really?
MR. SHATTUCK: Because as you know, in the early '30's Anderson County was just rural and agrarian Appalachian county. Had a lot of mining in the west and a lot of farms here in the eastern county. There was just one major industry and that was it. And then suddenly in the mid '30's we had Norris Dam, which was the first TVA project. And the impoundment of Norris Lake, which was a big deal back in the '30's. It really was nationwide. And then you know I think the dam was completed in '36 and incidentally the population of Anderson County went from nineteen thousand in 1930 to twenty-six thousand in 1940. You know that’s not big numbers, but that's a huge increase percentage wise. And that’s attributable to Norris Dam and all of sudden a new city, or new town in the county. Norris, Tennessee. And the second paved highway in the county. Government built highway 441, you know, the freeway from Lake City across Norris Dam all the way over to Hall's crossroads. So 1930, nineteen thousand people, 1940, twenty-six thousand people. 1943 there's eighty-five thousand people working on that Manhattan Project down in Oak Ridge, and of course, the world wide impact of that Project cannot be overstated.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely, let me ask you a question. Let's go back, when you moved to this area, you said as an infant, but you didn't move to Clinton until you were eight. Now where did you live?
MR. SHATTUCK: We lived in Knoxville for a short period of time and then we lived in Sunbright.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: A little country town up in Morgan County.
MR. MCDANIEL: And your dad he was the heavy equipment--
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah, he sold heavy equipment for International, for Power Equipment Company out of Knoxville, and he was a tremendous salesman. I brag here on my dad a little bit. It's not the chocolate bar. It's a Hershey's bar right?
MR. MCDANIEL: Right?
MR. SHATTUCK: And it's not a crawler tractor, it's a Caterpillar right?
MR. MCDANIEL: That's exactly right.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, he sold International Harvester, and his territory was the only territory in the world, where there was more International Harvester than Caterpillars.
MR. MCDANIEL: Is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah, he was, he was a very aggressive salesman and insisted on service for the customer after the sale.
MR. MCDANIEL: So I suppose that when Oak Ridge came in that was good for him, personally for his business.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, he sold some heavy equipment down there by the trainload.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, I'm sure he did. So you moved to Clinton when you were eight and that was in what year?
MR. SHATTUCK: 1948.
MR. MCDANIEL: 1948, so the whole time all the stuff going on in Oak Ridge and the Manhattan Project, you were just a child.
MR. SHATTUCK: That's right. In Sunbright.
MR. MCDANIEL: In Sunbright, there you go. But you moved to Clinton when you were eight years old, except when you went away to college you had been here ever since haven't you?
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, the college and the military.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right, the college and the military. So tell me a little bit about Anderson County and your teen years and living in Clinton.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, of course back then, Oak Ridge was about thirty-five thousand people. Entire Anderson County was about sixty-thousand people. Clinton was just four thousand then and now it’s about ten thousand. Now, Oak Ridge is about twenty-five to twenty-eight thousand. But all of Anderson County it's about seventy-five to eighty-thousand, so there has been a lot of growth out in the county, and a lot of that can be attributed to Oak Ridge. But there is a lot of history in the meantime. When I came here, Magnet Mills, you know the one industry that I talked about prior to 1930s or '40's; that was the one major industry in the county and it was still running.
MR. MCDANIEL: What was that? Was that a --
MR. SHATTUCK: --hosiery mill.
MR. MCDANIEL: Hosiery mill.
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah, huge, they had offices in the Empire State Building, New York City.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, really?
MR. SHATTUCK: Interesting thing is, it's a digression here, but in 1930 we had nineteen thousand people in the county. You had the mining in the western mountains and the farming down here. But Magnet Mills employed eleven hundred people. That's huge in a county of a total population of nineteen thousand. And those folks were good people, the owners and the operators. Magnet Mills was privately owned and locally run by natives of Anderson County primarily. And they were good people. But in that environment they did not want anything to happen. They preferred the status quo.
MR. MCDANIEL: They like things the way they were.
MR. SHATTUCK: And you talk about the status quo being disrupted, Norris Dam, and the new town of Norris and three years later here is the Manhattan Project. And the ability of those people, obviously was invaluable in the leadership in the county. And the way they adjusted was really and truly very admirable, I think. But in those days when I was a child, eight, nine years old, like I said, Clinton had Magnet Mills and was also a bedroom community for Oak Ridge and that was primarily it. But you know by the '50's we all knew what had happened at Oak Ridge and that effort was an ongoing effort. A lot of people forget that not only did that Manhattan Project end World War II and probably save hundreds of thousands of not only American lives but Japanese lives. After that we still had the Cold War to go through, which we went through until about 1989. And Oak Ridge's impact, influence and effect in that Cold War era also cannot be overestimated either.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely, Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: So as I say, growing up I had a high appreciation for Anderson County and what it had done and what it had contributed and how it had adjusted because you're talking about tremendous adjustments. Let's face it, in the '30's this was rural Appalachia. Suddenly you have thousands of Ph.D’s, the highest concentration in the world then, and probably still now. And I always say that, you know everybody always talks about the Secret City, but there were a lot of people that knew what they were there for.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right.
MR. SHATTUCK: And for them, at that point in time, 1943, it was a life and death project.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: Because everybody assumed Germany was ahead of us in the development of that weapon. So for those people who were involved, it was just amazing. The pressure they were under was literally life and death in that context. So along with those thousands of Ph.D.’s and engineers and chemists and physicists and on and on, you also had tens of thousands of workers that came in from the mid-west and the northeast and of course from all around here. But of course from all around here wasn't enough to meet their needs so a lot of people came from other parts of the country to work on that Manhattan Project.
MR. MCDANIEL: And I guess quite a number of them, like you said, lived in Clinton and out in the county.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, yeah, because the housing was at a premium all through that era. But along with those thousands of Ph.D.’s, engineers, chemists, physicists, you also had tens of thousands of workers. And after the first pay day or two, they are looking around. You know, where is the liquor? Where's the gambling? Where's the women and so on and so forth. And that in a county that was in the middle of the Bible Belt, dry; imagine those social and cultural impacts. They're just tremendous. You know, you have that impact of all those workers; you have the more advanced stage of background from those thousands of supervisor types. I mean Oak Ridge had its own symphony, and its own art society and it's just amazing to think about, you know the social, cultural impact, contribution that all that made to this county. And all the adjustments that were required from the social, cultural, and economic point of view, too.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure. Exactly.
MR. SHATTUCK: So it's an amazing history from any context, whether you are looking at it from the outside, in the terms of national and world impact, or whether you're looking at it from the inside in terms of local impact. It's just covers the whole strata so to speak.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure, exactly. And kind of in the middle of all that, you know we all know the story of the Clinton Twelve, that and the mid-1950’s, you know we had that. The integration issue to deal with.
MR. SHATTUCK: Right.
MR. MCDANIEL: And you were in the middle of that weren't you?
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, yes and Oak Ridge was too, believe it or not, because--
MR. MCDANIEL: I interviewed a fellow yesterday who- and African American man- who integrated Oak Ridge High School in '55, you know.
MR. SHATTUCK: Because Clinton, of course was the first public High School in the South to be desegregated.
MR. MCDANIEL: Actually he was a little irritated, he was like. They don't even throw us a bone, but you know.
MR. SHATTUCK: But every time I speak to those groups I can see, you know, wait a minute, Oak Ridge really was the first high school to be segregated back in '55.
MR. MCDANIEL: But it was federal, basically.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, it was a federal instillation, and the federal government and the High School Army and the AEC owned and administered and operated everything in Oak Ridge, including the homes.
MR. MCDANIEL: In '55 they still owned all the homes. I don't think they started selling the homes until later in '56 and '57.
MR. SHATTUCK: MSI, Management Services Incorporated sort of ran the city, in terms of water, sewer, electricity, painting the homes, sending the plumbers out to make repairs. It was truly a federal instillation.
MR. MCDANIEL: But the Clinton issue, talk a little bit about that. Talk about the integration of Clinton High School just for a little bit.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, of course, Oak Ridge had desegregated a year before, and it was not a huge public event in terms of publicity because primarily it was still a federal reservation, and the outside gates were still up, you know. But then after Clinton High desegregated in 1956, the third school year, later in 1958, was when Clinton High School was bombed. And of course the Oak Ridge folks stepped up immensely at that time, and you know as World War II was over, the population of Oak Ridge had decreased so they had some abandoned school buildings there in Oak Ridge, and the government made one of them available to the Anderson County school system to house Clinton High School. And the people turned out from Oak Ridge and Clinton and all over Anderson County, and that school had to be cleaned and painted and furnished and equipped. I mean, it was a huge effort. But in three days they got it all accomplished and Clinton High School was back in session. And in three days after it was bombed, it was replaced, the school building down in Oak Ridge, the old Linden school.
MR. MCDANIEL: And there were how many students that went from the High School to Linden? I mean it was a lot.
MR. SHATTUCK: The student body of Oak Ridge, I mean, Clinton High School back at that time was about seven hundred.
MR. MCDANIEL: That's right. Which is great, that's a great story, the relationship between Oak Ridge and Clinton is always been unique and in what has happened in Oak Ridge has benefited Anderson County. But there has also been a little bit, been antagonistic just hear it. And I don't want to get into that--
MR. SHATTUCK: But I do, because it is the most overblown, exaggerated nonsense I've ever heard.
MR. MCDANIEL: Well, talk about that.
MR. SHATTUCK: This is a long string of a story but in the early 1960’s Anderson County created one of the first industrial recruitment agencies in the south eastern United States. And that was a joint effort of county folks and Oak Ridge folks, who worked together in perfect harmony. And through the years of course industrial recruitment in Anderson County was very difficult. Because no industry, not private industry up north or east or west, wanted to come to Anderson County and compete with the wage scale that Union Carbide offered at Oak Ridge. So recruiting private industry then in Anderson County was a tough thing to do. We got our first industry in 1968, and then in the '70's we picked up two, three more. And then in the 80's it really boomed. Long and short of it is that we've located forty-five factories out here in Anderson County through that industrial recruitment effort. And a little incidental here, when the Cold War ended in 1989, you know, we had the downsizing in Oak Ridge. A lot of layoffs and a lot less work, but in the mean time because of the private industry that had located out here in the county, our tax base increased by one hundred percent.
MR. MCDANIEL: Is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: Every ten years from '85 to '95, '86 and so forth through there and that was a life saver for this county because if we'd have nothing except the downsizing of Oak Ridge, we would have been hurting. But we had in addition to that downsizing, we had these new industries coming in to our industrial parks out here. And believe me, the Oak Ridge folks working with Anderson County folks were instrumental in that being something that could happen. Little did they realize in 1960 when they started it, what effect it would have in 1990, when the Cold War ended. But not only was it them working together but you had the County Commission which was composed of several commissioners from Oak Ridge and Commissioners from out here in the county. They had to work together to appropriate money to either buy the industrial land for the future industrial parks, extend infrastructure, water sewer, gas, rail, highways. And you know it's a huge undertaking, and without the County Commission, which is composed of Oak Ridge and Anderson County residents working together, that wouldn't have happened. But people lose sight of that big picture. If some County Commissioner, some Oak Ridge Commissioner get in a scrabble over a specific issue. Well, that's Oak Ridge, versus Anderson. Well that’s not it, that's not the way it happened.
MR. MCDANIEL: Why was that? Where does that come from?
MR. SHATTUCK: It's a combination of things. And let’s face it, those thousands of Ph.D.’s that came to Oak Ridge and started symphony orchestras and art shows and all this, they had a tendency to look down their nose a little bit at the county folks and of course, on the other side, the county folks were a little bent out of shape because, you know, they resented, were jealous or what have you of the higher educational background, those folks of higher educational, cultural background. I mean it's a natural thing. Lord, at high school football, basketball; I could remember in the '40's, you know, Clinton and Oak Ridge would play football. Well, Clinton usually beat them because Oak Ridge was just getting started. And here come the late ‘40's and early ‘50's and Oak Ridge is not only state champions but national champions, they are just walloping Clinton unmercifully. So they ended up having a couple fights after the ball games and Oak Ridge was just whipping Clinton unmercifully so they terminated the series. It was funny, my senior year in high school, we had a good football team; we went and only lost one game the whole season. So everybody said okay Clinton has come back, they're ready to start playing Oak Ridge again. Well, all of us graduated. There was only one letterman that returned and they went down to Oak Ridge, I believe in 1957, I believe and got demolished again because everybody had graduated you know. But that rivalry in football and basketball is also, let’s face it, high school sports, that’s huge in the southeast.
MR. MCDANIEL: But that's normal. I mean cites that are closed to each other, there is always a rivalry.
MR. SHATTUCK: I can remember Clinton and Lake City used to have a huge rivalry so, I mean, you take all that and the personal little squabbles and natural resentment that might flow both ways and the different social and cultural backgrounds. From that, Clinton and Oak Ridge don't get along? It’s just not so. They do get along and they've worked together for the tremendous benefit of this county overall.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know somebody told me a story once and I want you to tell me about it. Its cause folks from Oak Ridge would venture out and they'd go different places and, you know, there was a particular hotel in Clinton that had the best Sunday dinner in the state from what I understand. And I’ve had several people that I’ve interview that have talked about going there.
MR. SHATTUCK: To the Park Hotel.
MR. MCDANIEL: To the Park Hotel. Tell me about the Park Hotel.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well the Park Hotel was up there on Market Street next to the railroad station. And of course there had always been a hotel there since the railroad came through in about 1858, I think it was. And of course it went through evolutions and ultimately became the Park Hotel which was its last reincarnation so to speak. And for decades it was a very popular place to eat. All the local clubs, you know the Optimist, the Lions, and the Rotaries all met there for their dinner or breakfast or whatever. So it was a very popular place. Since then, we've had the antique stores that have taken up Market Street and they've become a hub for this whole region. So people come back to Market Street for the antique stores now. The old hotel fell victim to modern plumbing, electrical, fire codes and other codes you know. But they're probably by the nature of the way things got set up to start with the Manhattan Project and that tremendous security that existed in Oak Ridge, there was a lack of interaction anyway because people from the county just couldn't go to Oak Ridge to shop or couldn't go to Oak Ridge to movies or what have you. And because we were still a rural Appalachian county in a lot of ways, there was more for the Oak Ridge folks to do in Oak Ridge than for them to come to Clinton to interact and so forth. I think the existence of Norris Lake helped to solve this, helped that a little bit because everyone wanted to go boating and fishing. But the folks in Oak Ridge had more to do in Oak Ridge and what they didn't have to do in Oak Ridge, they could do in Knoxville rather than go to Oliver Springs and Clinton or Lake City or what have you.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know, like you said, it was surrounded by a fence and the people were, that was kind of their own little world so there was a natural separation between Oak Ridge and the rest of the county. But through the years like you said, the industries and things such as that, there has been a, the county and Oak Ridge have worked together--
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh! It's been amazing.
MR. MCDANIEL: And what are some of the other things that have, and you touched on this a little bit about this in the late '80's about the downsizing of Oak Ridge, really didn't affect the county because of the preparation that had been done thirty years earlier.
MR. SHATTUCK: Done unknowingly, I mean none of them could have anticipated that the Cold War would have ended but nevertheless, thank heavens we had that recruitment effort in place and functioning and functioning well.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure.
MR. SHATTUCK: Otherwise the downsizing in Oak Ridge would have been very devastating to this county economically.
MR. MCDANIEL: Since 1990 or so, the last twenty years, how are things in the county? How are things in the county, in Clinton, and in Oak Ridge?
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, excellent, excellent. I think all of the municipal governments in Anderson County think and run very efficiently and effectively. High level of services, generally speaking. I mean Clinton is now a town of ten thousand and has one of the highest levels of public services, police, fire, water, sewer, recreation and so forth. And the irony of it, a town as small as Norris, small as Lake City they have excellent public services.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right.
MR. SHATTUCK: And I think there is a pride in being able to provide those facilities and those amenities for the folks.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right but some of these towns, small towns to be in, Oak Ridge is included in this, have fallen victim to the, you know, what I call the Wal-Martization of our --
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, yeah, we've fallen victim to the interstate system. Because it really changed things.
MR. MCDANIEL: Tell me, tell me about that.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well of course, I-75, the main north south route that goes through Anderson County, wasn't even completed until mid-70's here in Anderson County. Of course with that interstate and those interchanges, you have tremendous commercial development that occurs at those interchanges. And with the development of modern marketing techniques, you know such as Wal-Mart, Walgreens, and Lowe’s and Home Depot and all that you can name, you know, the whole business form or program is different. And of course small town main streets have suffered and suffered tremendously. Clinton was lucky, our small town main street was suffering tremendously but we got very lucky with these antique stores. I mean it wasn't fifteen years ago there were only about two or three doors open on Market Street here in Clinton. And now they're all open and we just got lucky. You know the town participated in the helping by advertising up on interstate and so forth what was down there on Market Street. What happened in Oak Ridge, that's very, very complicated.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure.
MR. SHATTUCK: When the Glazers, I think that was their name, first developed the Oak Ridge Shopping Center it was the best of its kind in East Tennessee. Knoxville didn't have anything to compete with it really but it probably may have been a victim of its own success, I don't know because it sure didn't follow through with the modern marketing scheme.
MR. MCDANIEL: And it not being on the interstate, I mean it was kind of on its own, you know. And when excessive building and the huge expansion of West Knoxville went out west.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh yeah, Turkey Creek has really, in the close future and the close past, the development of Turkey Creek has really been difficult, but there is a tendency, and it exists in Oak Ridge too, and I’m being critical of Oak Ridge and I don't mean to be, but very progressive in its thinking but unfortunately with some of that progressivism comes to tighten attitude about development. And overzealous zoning and coding regulation can have an effect on development. The fact that they aren't near an interstate obviously had an effect. But if you remember Turkey Creek, it took those developers over ten years to get Turkey Creek approved. I mean, there was protest for every level of zoning you could think of, wetlands. Everything you could think of in terms of protest before Zoning Board and Board of Zoning Appeals and even in the courts. Those developers, it took them ten years.
MR. MCDANIEL: And that's just--
MR. SHATTUCK: Even to get approval to develop Turkey Creek and you see what it is now. It is lovely; there is no negative significant environmental impact. They preserved some wetlands over there and it's a literal cash cow.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: For the City of Knoxville and Knox County. And you know those things can hamper development that should and could occur.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right, exactly. That could occurred, could have occurred in Oak Ridge perhaps.
MR. SHATTUCK: And another issue. Because, I’ve been involved in industrial developments since the late ‘60’s, but everybody says we want industry but we want high-tech, high paying jobs. Well, that is not a good overview. Number one, all industry today is high-tech. Our former county executive, Dave Bolling said a wheelbarrow factory is high-tech.
MR. MCDANIEL: It is.
MR. SHATTUCK: It better be or it's not going to be in business for very long. And that's true.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know laser cutting and you know design and robotics and all that.
MR. SHATTUCK: And everything's got to be high-tech today. I mean the distribution center, the Food Lion is high-tech. I mean you just go on and on through industries you name them and you say well that's not high-tech. Well--
MR. MCDANIEL: It has to be.
MR. SHATTUCK: It's got to be to compete. The idea of, well it just pays minimum wage jobs, well not true. All the industries that we've recruited in Anderson County pay more than minimum wage. But look at it this way. For an economy in a society to be truly viable in my opinion at least, you've got to have all those jobs. You've got to have jobs at and near minimum wage and --
MR. MCDANIEL: On up.
MR. SHATTUCK: How do you climb the economic ladder if the first two rungs are not there? You can't get started. This was, Oak Ridge has really worked very hard to attract some private industry and it’s difficult because, let’s face it. All these forty-five industries we located out here in Anderson County, fantastic, wonderful, it increased our tax base, about a hundred percent in ten years. In the meantime, Oak Ridge was working on federal projects. The Breeder Reactor didn't quite go. The Centrifuge didn't quite go. AVLIS didn't quite go. And the Spallation Neutron, it went over four billion dollars of investment, which is much more than all forty-five of our industries out here put together, you see. So Oak Ridge was doing it right in terms of continuing to look for these big projects.
MR. MCDANIEL: They kind of had their eggs in one big basket though sometimes.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, I know, but they think about that and the SNS. The potential for the betterment of mankind is almost infinite. So their effort to try to recruit private industry is great and I applaud it but it's difficult and it's hampered a little bit by--
MR. MCDANIEL: Who they are.
MR. SHATTUCK: This preconceived attitude of high-tech. I was speaking with one group and they said why is Anderson County attracting so many industries, and Oak Ridge can't attract private industry? Well, I said, well, number one, Oak Ridge is in a different kind of business and should be. But number two, let me ask you this; what if Clayton Homes had wanted to open a plant in Oak Ridge? Oh, I don't think they'd want that. And I said do you know why, well it doesn't pay enough and isn't high-tech. And I said stop, Clayton Homes starts their beginning laborers at higher wage than Boeing which had a plant there in Oak Ridge. Plus that man that was just starting, if his crew meets a quota, he gets a bonus. So the pay is just as good and the high-tech is there.
MR. MCDANIEL: It's the perception.
MR. SHATTUCK: That's right. People draw quick perceptions. People still today, you say industry and they think Pittsburgh in the 1930’s and it's just not the way it is. But that perception is there. It is really difficult to convince people otherwise sometimes, but believe me; Oak Ridge has done more to broaden everybody's outlook than it has in narrowing it.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure. What, looking towards the future for Anderson County, I mean what would you like to see? What do you think is, is feasible and obtainable.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, feasible and obtainable is continuing to provide the quality of life that we've provided the last sixty years. Oak Ridge, I will, think will continue to be on the cutting edge of projects that have national and even international impact. I mean, the impact of SNS is hard to overestimate also. It's a beautiful area and people want to come here, we've probably been blessed in not having a population explosion. I mean the population in 1950 was probably about sixty-thousand and in '60 about sixty-thousand in '70 it had grown about sixty-five thousand. '80 it might have been seventy, but the population growth has been relatively modest.
MR. MCDANIEL: So there is room for everybody.
MR. SHATTUCK: You're right; there is room for everybody and with this modest growth of population. We've had a tremendous growth in the tax base. Well, that's the best of both worlds. You know you still have space, you still have amenities, and you have a tax base to support public services. You're living in a county that has three or four of the best museums in the world.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: You’re living in a county that has Norris Lake and Norris Dam. You're living in a county that has Oak Ridge on a cutting edge of so many different things. Some of which we don't even know yet. It's an exciting place to live now just as it has been for the past fifty or sixty years. And of course, I'm an old coot now and they may not sound very inspirational to want more of the same but more of the same--
MR. MCDANIEL: Is a good thing.
MR. SHATTUCK: It's not the same because in this modern age, more of the same, and I’m talking about responsible progressive development, is in a totally different context now than it was in the ‘60’s or ‘70’s. So more of the same given the modern improvements that exist and are an intricate part of any development now.
MR. MCDANIEL: Talk a little bit about, you know the quality of life and the-- excuse me, the culture of Anderson County. I know you've touched on that a little bit but you know over the years what has, what has made it such a good quality of life. And of the place where people would want to raise a family.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, of course we are blessed with beautiful area. Rivers, mountains, lakes. We've been blessed with tremendous natural resources. I mean the 19th century you had the coal and the lumber off the mountains. You had good farm land here in the county. We had Norris Dam and Norris Lake. We had the Manhattan Project and its contributions and all the contributions we've talked about earlier about Oak Ridge. It's amazing that socially and culturally we have stayed in a pretty stable, but yet progressive mode.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure.
MR. SHATTUCK: So, you've got to have the stability and you've got to have the progress.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right.
MR. SHATTUCK: They go together and with that stability the progress ends up being much more beneficial to many, many more people.
MR. MCDANIEL: And as communities change, which they all do over the years. It seems like Anderson County hasn't changed that much as far as quality of life issues go. I mean, they've improved but they've not, whereas you look at a place like Detroit, you know? That lost industry that you can't live there anymore, it's too dangerous, you know almost. So, I guess Anderson County has had a little bit, has seen has always had a little bit of a, I don't want to say, a crime issue, which they've not, but I guess every community has got something. But it's not, it's always been, in my opinion and this is your interview, has always been kind of small, a small part of what the life is.
MR. SHATTUCK: Every crime issue in the county has been very manageable in my opinion. But when we talk about quality of life, yes, we had it then and we have it now, but you know, quality of life now includes so much more in terms of transportation and communications and modern conveniences. That quality of life is just much, much broader now than it ever was before. And perhaps some of it to old codgers like us may be counterproductive too.
MR. MCDANIEL: I understand.
MR. SHATTUCK: That's not for me judge at this point, but it's, I guess, it's that combination of stability and dynamism that exists here in this county.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right.
MR. SHATTUCK: And it certainly has since the '30's at least. And probably before that actually. This county was the number one coal producing county in the state of Tennessee.
MR. MCDANIEL: I was going to ask you about that. Talk a little bit about the coal.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, well, of course.
MR. MCDANIEL: The northern part of the county.
MR. SHATTUCK: Its number one since about 1880s it's been the number one coal producing county in the state or it was up until about the ‘80's. The Windrock Mine down on near Oliver Springs. There is a lady from Oak Ridge that wrote a book called "Circling Windrock Mountain". And incidentally, that's the lady from Oak Ridge who came in here from, I don't know where, but she saw something interesting and I'd recommend that book to anybody. Because she went out there in the boonies and interviewed all the folks and really got the low down on social, cultural, economic life of Windrock Mountain and its environs. It said they sold the first television in Anderson County at the company store at Windrock.
MR. MCDANIEL: Is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: They didn't have TV in Knoxville then, but up on Windrock Mountain they could get antenna as clear as a bell.
MR. MCDANIEL: I had no idea.
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah that's a fact. And that mine was owned by Bessemer out of Birmingham and all their coal went to their steel mills in Birmingham and somebody said, I don't, I can't verify this, but there are over twelve hundred shafts under that mountain. I can't verify that, but you know the coal has been a tremendous part of this county’s history. Not only being the largest producer, but you have heard of the Coal Creek Wars. It started in Briceville and lead to the abolishment of the convict labor system in Tennessee and the abolishment of the convict labor system nationwide. In about a two to four year period. Unfortunately the largest mine disaster up to its time occurred in Fraterville in 1902, or somewhere like that.
MR. MCDANIEL: 1902. Yes.
MR. SHATTUCK: But along with that there has been tremendous timber that came off that and along with all that coal and timber production you had a lot of fortunes made. And some of those fortunes where invested in Oliver Springs. It was a tourist mecca.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: For 1895 to about 1905 they had those magnificent old Victorian hotels down there. People came from all over the eastern United States to Oliver Springs to take the springs and you know soak in the water, drink the water. And hotels were magnificent with a marble fireplace in each room and grand piano in each room.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know, I just did a documentary on the history of Grainger County, and part of that was Tate Springs, which was the same type of resort.
MR. SHATTUCK: Red Boling Springs out in Middle Tennessee. Beersheba Springs around southwest. But Oliver Springs was one of the jewels in that sequence.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure.
MR. SHATTUCK: But that's had a tremendous effect. You know the irony, that coal; I'd say more than any county in the state; in the coal production through the '50's, '60's, and the '70's because it was deep mines and then they started the strip mining and then the equipment got better and they could go back and strip mine coal they wouldn't have tried earlier. And kept on and on and lead to a lot of environmental issues also.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure exactly.
MR. SHATTUCK: But that's been an interesting history to follow.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know it, I’m sure it has been. Thinking about the energy, specifically, you had Norris Dam in the 1930’s, late '30’s.
MR. SHATTUCK: But stop to think about this. I'm interrupting you. Largest coal producing county in the state for all those decades. The first, therefore the largest, hydroelectric producer in the state. Then you have atomic power at Oak Ridge, first, you have wind turbines down there at Windrock now. And now you know that we're the largest natural gas producer in the state of Tennessee.
MR. MCDANIEL: Is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah, Yeah.
MR. MCDANIEL: So Anderson County--
MR. SHATTUCK: Energy has always been an integral part of this county's history.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: But that energy--
MR. MCDANIEL: Not only producing it but in consuming it with Oak Ridge.
MR. SHATTUCK: Exactly.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know during the Manhattan Project, you know.
MR. SHATTUCK: Do you know that one statistic that I still just can't believe? That the Manhattan Project consumed one-seventh of all the electricity generated in America.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: I mean. That’s unbelievable.
MR. MCDANIEL: That's what I mean, it was incredible. It was incredible.
MR. SHATTUCK: The history of this county, it's amazing a county this size and the history it's had through these decades is amazing really. Fascinating and unique and puts us way ahead a lot of counties much larger than we are, in terms of that history.
MR. MCDANIEL: Well, is there anything else you want to talk about?
MR. SHATTUCK: No, just I’m very impressed with what Oak Ridge has meant to this county and to this nation and to the world.
[END OF INTERVIEW]

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ORAL HISTORY OF JERRY SHATTUCK
Interviewed by Keith McDaniel
February 2, 2012
MR. MCDANIEL: This is Keith McDaniel and today is February 2nd, 2012 and I am at the home of Jerry Shattuck in Clinton. Jerry, thank you for taking the time to talk to us.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well glad to do it.
MR. MCDANIEL: Jerry, you've been around this area for a long time, so why don't we start with something about you and your background. Tell me something about you, where you were born and raised and your family.
MR. SHATTUCK: Okay, well I was born in Bradford, Pennsylvania, but my family moved down here when I was still an infant. And after a while we moved to Clinton, in 1948. I was about eight years old at that time.
MR. MCDANIEL: Were you?
MR. SHATTUCK: And my father was a heavy equipment sales man and Oak Ridge, the Manhattan Project was part of his territory.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: So, you know growing up, my formulative years, the ‘40’s and the ‘50’s, and went off to college in the late ‘50’s. I grew up very impressed, I can say, in the county that I grew up in.
MR. MCDANIEL: Really?
MR. SHATTUCK: Because as you know, in the early '30's Anderson County was just rural and agrarian Appalachian county. Had a lot of mining in the west and a lot of farms here in the eastern county. There was just one major industry and that was it. And then suddenly in the mid '30's we had Norris Dam, which was the first TVA project. And the impoundment of Norris Lake, which was a big deal back in the '30's. It really was nationwide. And then you know I think the dam was completed in '36 and incidentally the population of Anderson County went from nineteen thousand in 1930 to twenty-six thousand in 1940. You know that’s not big numbers, but that's a huge increase percentage wise. And that’s attributable to Norris Dam and all of sudden a new city, or new town in the county. Norris, Tennessee. And the second paved highway in the county. Government built highway 441, you know, the freeway from Lake City across Norris Dam all the way over to Hall's crossroads. So 1930, nineteen thousand people, 1940, twenty-six thousand people. 1943 there's eighty-five thousand people working on that Manhattan Project down in Oak Ridge, and of course, the world wide impact of that Project cannot be overstated.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely, let me ask you a question. Let's go back, when you moved to this area, you said as an infant, but you didn't move to Clinton until you were eight. Now where did you live?
MR. SHATTUCK: We lived in Knoxville for a short period of time and then we lived in Sunbright.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: A little country town up in Morgan County.
MR. MCDANIEL: And your dad he was the heavy equipment--
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah, he sold heavy equipment for International, for Power Equipment Company out of Knoxville, and he was a tremendous salesman. I brag here on my dad a little bit. It's not the chocolate bar. It's a Hershey's bar right?
MR. MCDANIEL: Right?
MR. SHATTUCK: And it's not a crawler tractor, it's a Caterpillar right?
MR. MCDANIEL: That's exactly right.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, he sold International Harvester, and his territory was the only territory in the world, where there was more International Harvester than Caterpillars.
MR. MCDANIEL: Is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah, he was, he was a very aggressive salesman and insisted on service for the customer after the sale.
MR. MCDANIEL: So I suppose that when Oak Ridge came in that was good for him, personally for his business.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, he sold some heavy equipment down there by the trainload.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, I'm sure he did. So you moved to Clinton when you were eight and that was in what year?
MR. SHATTUCK: 1948.
MR. MCDANIEL: 1948, so the whole time all the stuff going on in Oak Ridge and the Manhattan Project, you were just a child.
MR. SHATTUCK: That's right. In Sunbright.
MR. MCDANIEL: In Sunbright, there you go. But you moved to Clinton when you were eight years old, except when you went away to college you had been here ever since haven't you?
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, the college and the military.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right, the college and the military. So tell me a little bit about Anderson County and your teen years and living in Clinton.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, of course back then, Oak Ridge was about thirty-five thousand people. Entire Anderson County was about sixty-thousand people. Clinton was just four thousand then and now it’s about ten thousand. Now, Oak Ridge is about twenty-five to twenty-eight thousand. But all of Anderson County it's about seventy-five to eighty-thousand, so there has been a lot of growth out in the county, and a lot of that can be attributed to Oak Ridge. But there is a lot of history in the meantime. When I came here, Magnet Mills, you know the one industry that I talked about prior to 1930s or '40's; that was the one major industry in the county and it was still running.
MR. MCDANIEL: What was that? Was that a --
MR. SHATTUCK: --hosiery mill.
MR. MCDANIEL: Hosiery mill.
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah, huge, they had offices in the Empire State Building, New York City.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, really?
MR. SHATTUCK: Interesting thing is, it's a digression here, but in 1930 we had nineteen thousand people in the county. You had the mining in the western mountains and the farming down here. But Magnet Mills employed eleven hundred people. That's huge in a county of a total population of nineteen thousand. And those folks were good people, the owners and the operators. Magnet Mills was privately owned and locally run by natives of Anderson County primarily. And they were good people. But in that environment they did not want anything to happen. They preferred the status quo.
MR. MCDANIEL: They like things the way they were.
MR. SHATTUCK: And you talk about the status quo being disrupted, Norris Dam, and the new town of Norris and three years later here is the Manhattan Project. And the ability of those people, obviously was invaluable in the leadership in the county. And the way they adjusted was really and truly very admirable, I think. But in those days when I was a child, eight, nine years old, like I said, Clinton had Magnet Mills and was also a bedroom community for Oak Ridge and that was primarily it. But you know by the '50's we all knew what had happened at Oak Ridge and that effort was an ongoing effort. A lot of people forget that not only did that Manhattan Project end World War II and probably save hundreds of thousands of not only American lives but Japanese lives. After that we still had the Cold War to go through, which we went through until about 1989. And Oak Ridge's impact, influence and effect in that Cold War era also cannot be overestimated either.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely, Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: So as I say, growing up I had a high appreciation for Anderson County and what it had done and what it had contributed and how it had adjusted because you're talking about tremendous adjustments. Let's face it, in the '30's this was rural Appalachia. Suddenly you have thousands of Ph.D’s, the highest concentration in the world then, and probably still now. And I always say that, you know everybody always talks about the Secret City, but there were a lot of people that knew what they were there for.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right.
MR. SHATTUCK: And for them, at that point in time, 1943, it was a life and death project.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: Because everybody assumed Germany was ahead of us in the development of that weapon. So for those people who were involved, it was just amazing. The pressure they were under was literally life and death in that context. So along with those thousands of Ph.D.’s and engineers and chemists and physicists and on and on, you also had tens of thousands of workers that came in from the mid-west and the northeast and of course from all around here. But of course from all around here wasn't enough to meet their needs so a lot of people came from other parts of the country to work on that Manhattan Project.
MR. MCDANIEL: And I guess quite a number of them, like you said, lived in Clinton and out in the county.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, yeah, because the housing was at a premium all through that era. But along with those thousands of Ph.D.’s, engineers, chemists, physicists, you also had tens of thousands of workers. And after the first pay day or two, they are looking around. You know, where is the liquor? Where's the gambling? Where's the women and so on and so forth. And that in a county that was in the middle of the Bible Belt, dry; imagine those social and cultural impacts. They're just tremendous. You know, you have that impact of all those workers; you have the more advanced stage of background from those thousands of supervisor types. I mean Oak Ridge had its own symphony, and its own art society and it's just amazing to think about, you know the social, cultural impact, contribution that all that made to this county. And all the adjustments that were required from the social, cultural, and economic point of view, too.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure. Exactly.
MR. SHATTUCK: So it's an amazing history from any context, whether you are looking at it from the outside, in the terms of national and world impact, or whether you're looking at it from the inside in terms of local impact. It's just covers the whole strata so to speak.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure, exactly. And kind of in the middle of all that, you know we all know the story of the Clinton Twelve, that and the mid-1950’s, you know we had that. The integration issue to deal with.
MR. SHATTUCK: Right.
MR. MCDANIEL: And you were in the middle of that weren't you?
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, yes and Oak Ridge was too, believe it or not, because--
MR. MCDANIEL: I interviewed a fellow yesterday who- and African American man- who integrated Oak Ridge High School in '55, you know.
MR. SHATTUCK: Because Clinton, of course was the first public High School in the South to be desegregated.
MR. MCDANIEL: Actually he was a little irritated, he was like. They don't even throw us a bone, but you know.
MR. SHATTUCK: But every time I speak to those groups I can see, you know, wait a minute, Oak Ridge really was the first high school to be segregated back in '55.
MR. MCDANIEL: But it was federal, basically.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, it was a federal instillation, and the federal government and the High School Army and the AEC owned and administered and operated everything in Oak Ridge, including the homes.
MR. MCDANIEL: In '55 they still owned all the homes. I don't think they started selling the homes until later in '56 and '57.
MR. SHATTUCK: MSI, Management Services Incorporated sort of ran the city, in terms of water, sewer, electricity, painting the homes, sending the plumbers out to make repairs. It was truly a federal instillation.
MR. MCDANIEL: But the Clinton issue, talk a little bit about that. Talk about the integration of Clinton High School just for a little bit.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, of course, Oak Ridge had desegregated a year before, and it was not a huge public event in terms of publicity because primarily it was still a federal reservation, and the outside gates were still up, you know. But then after Clinton High desegregated in 1956, the third school year, later in 1958, was when Clinton High School was bombed. And of course the Oak Ridge folks stepped up immensely at that time, and you know as World War II was over, the population of Oak Ridge had decreased so they had some abandoned school buildings there in Oak Ridge, and the government made one of them available to the Anderson County school system to house Clinton High School. And the people turned out from Oak Ridge and Clinton and all over Anderson County, and that school had to be cleaned and painted and furnished and equipped. I mean, it was a huge effort. But in three days they got it all accomplished and Clinton High School was back in session. And in three days after it was bombed, it was replaced, the school building down in Oak Ridge, the old Linden school.
MR. MCDANIEL: And there were how many students that went from the High School to Linden? I mean it was a lot.
MR. SHATTUCK: The student body of Oak Ridge, I mean, Clinton High School back at that time was about seven hundred.
MR. MCDANIEL: That's right. Which is great, that's a great story, the relationship between Oak Ridge and Clinton is always been unique and in what has happened in Oak Ridge has benefited Anderson County. But there has also been a little bit, been antagonistic just hear it. And I don't want to get into that--
MR. SHATTUCK: But I do, because it is the most overblown, exaggerated nonsense I've ever heard.
MR. MCDANIEL: Well, talk about that.
MR. SHATTUCK: This is a long string of a story but in the early 1960’s Anderson County created one of the first industrial recruitment agencies in the south eastern United States. And that was a joint effort of county folks and Oak Ridge folks, who worked together in perfect harmony. And through the years of course industrial recruitment in Anderson County was very difficult. Because no industry, not private industry up north or east or west, wanted to come to Anderson County and compete with the wage scale that Union Carbide offered at Oak Ridge. So recruiting private industry then in Anderson County was a tough thing to do. We got our first industry in 1968, and then in the '70's we picked up two, three more. And then in the 80's it really boomed. Long and short of it is that we've located forty-five factories out here in Anderson County through that industrial recruitment effort. And a little incidental here, when the Cold War ended in 1989, you know, we had the downsizing in Oak Ridge. A lot of layoffs and a lot less work, but in the mean time because of the private industry that had located out here in the county, our tax base increased by one hundred percent.
MR. MCDANIEL: Is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: Every ten years from '85 to '95, '86 and so forth through there and that was a life saver for this county because if we'd have nothing except the downsizing of Oak Ridge, we would have been hurting. But we had in addition to that downsizing, we had these new industries coming in to our industrial parks out here. And believe me, the Oak Ridge folks working with Anderson County folks were instrumental in that being something that could happen. Little did they realize in 1960 when they started it, what effect it would have in 1990, when the Cold War ended. But not only was it them working together but you had the County Commission which was composed of several commissioners from Oak Ridge and Commissioners from out here in the county. They had to work together to appropriate money to either buy the industrial land for the future industrial parks, extend infrastructure, water sewer, gas, rail, highways. And you know it's a huge undertaking, and without the County Commission, which is composed of Oak Ridge and Anderson County residents working together, that wouldn't have happened. But people lose sight of that big picture. If some County Commissioner, some Oak Ridge Commissioner get in a scrabble over a specific issue. Well, that's Oak Ridge, versus Anderson. Well that’s not it, that's not the way it happened.
MR. MCDANIEL: Why was that? Where does that come from?
MR. SHATTUCK: It's a combination of things. And let’s face it, those thousands of Ph.D.’s that came to Oak Ridge and started symphony orchestras and art shows and all this, they had a tendency to look down their nose a little bit at the county folks and of course, on the other side, the county folks were a little bent out of shape because, you know, they resented, were jealous or what have you of the higher educational background, those folks of higher educational, cultural background. I mean it's a natural thing. Lord, at high school football, basketball; I could remember in the '40's, you know, Clinton and Oak Ridge would play football. Well, Clinton usually beat them because Oak Ridge was just getting started. And here come the late ‘40's and early ‘50's and Oak Ridge is not only state champions but national champions, they are just walloping Clinton unmercifully. So they ended up having a couple fights after the ball games and Oak Ridge was just whipping Clinton unmercifully so they terminated the series. It was funny, my senior year in high school, we had a good football team; we went and only lost one game the whole season. So everybody said okay Clinton has come back, they're ready to start playing Oak Ridge again. Well, all of us graduated. There was only one letterman that returned and they went down to Oak Ridge, I believe in 1957, I believe and got demolished again because everybody had graduated you know. But that rivalry in football and basketball is also, let’s face it, high school sports, that’s huge in the southeast.
MR. MCDANIEL: But that's normal. I mean cites that are closed to each other, there is always a rivalry.
MR. SHATTUCK: I can remember Clinton and Lake City used to have a huge rivalry so, I mean, you take all that and the personal little squabbles and natural resentment that might flow both ways and the different social and cultural backgrounds. From that, Clinton and Oak Ridge don't get along? It’s just not so. They do get along and they've worked together for the tremendous benefit of this county overall.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know somebody told me a story once and I want you to tell me about it. Its cause folks from Oak Ridge would venture out and they'd go different places and, you know, there was a particular hotel in Clinton that had the best Sunday dinner in the state from what I understand. And I’ve had several people that I’ve interview that have talked about going there.
MR. SHATTUCK: To the Park Hotel.
MR. MCDANIEL: To the Park Hotel. Tell me about the Park Hotel.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well the Park Hotel was up there on Market Street next to the railroad station. And of course there had always been a hotel there since the railroad came through in about 1858, I think it was. And of course it went through evolutions and ultimately became the Park Hotel which was its last reincarnation so to speak. And for decades it was a very popular place to eat. All the local clubs, you know the Optimist, the Lions, and the Rotaries all met there for their dinner or breakfast or whatever. So it was a very popular place. Since then, we've had the antique stores that have taken up Market Street and they've become a hub for this whole region. So people come back to Market Street for the antique stores now. The old hotel fell victim to modern plumbing, electrical, fire codes and other codes you know. But they're probably by the nature of the way things got set up to start with the Manhattan Project and that tremendous security that existed in Oak Ridge, there was a lack of interaction anyway because people from the county just couldn't go to Oak Ridge to shop or couldn't go to Oak Ridge to movies or what have you. And because we were still a rural Appalachian county in a lot of ways, there was more for the Oak Ridge folks to do in Oak Ridge than for them to come to Clinton to interact and so forth. I think the existence of Norris Lake helped to solve this, helped that a little bit because everyone wanted to go boating and fishing. But the folks in Oak Ridge had more to do in Oak Ridge and what they didn't have to do in Oak Ridge, they could do in Knoxville rather than go to Oliver Springs and Clinton or Lake City or what have you.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know, like you said, it was surrounded by a fence and the people were, that was kind of their own little world so there was a natural separation between Oak Ridge and the rest of the county. But through the years like you said, the industries and things such as that, there has been a, the county and Oak Ridge have worked together--
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh! It's been amazing.
MR. MCDANIEL: And what are some of the other things that have, and you touched on this a little bit about this in the late '80's about the downsizing of Oak Ridge, really didn't affect the county because of the preparation that had been done thirty years earlier.
MR. SHATTUCK: Done unknowingly, I mean none of them could have anticipated that the Cold War would have ended but nevertheless, thank heavens we had that recruitment effort in place and functioning and functioning well.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure.
MR. SHATTUCK: Otherwise the downsizing in Oak Ridge would have been very devastating to this county economically.
MR. MCDANIEL: Since 1990 or so, the last twenty years, how are things in the county? How are things in the county, in Clinton, and in Oak Ridge?
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, excellent, excellent. I think all of the municipal governments in Anderson County think and run very efficiently and effectively. High level of services, generally speaking. I mean Clinton is now a town of ten thousand and has one of the highest levels of public services, police, fire, water, sewer, recreation and so forth. And the irony of it, a town as small as Norris, small as Lake City they have excellent public services.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right.
MR. SHATTUCK: And I think there is a pride in being able to provide those facilities and those amenities for the folks.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right but some of these towns, small towns to be in, Oak Ridge is included in this, have fallen victim to the, you know, what I call the Wal-Martization of our --
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, yeah, we've fallen victim to the interstate system. Because it really changed things.
MR. MCDANIEL: Tell me, tell me about that.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well of course, I-75, the main north south route that goes through Anderson County, wasn't even completed until mid-70's here in Anderson County. Of course with that interstate and those interchanges, you have tremendous commercial development that occurs at those interchanges. And with the development of modern marketing techniques, you know such as Wal-Mart, Walgreens, and Lowe’s and Home Depot and all that you can name, you know, the whole business form or program is different. And of course small town main streets have suffered and suffered tremendously. Clinton was lucky, our small town main street was suffering tremendously but we got very lucky with these antique stores. I mean it wasn't fifteen years ago there were only about two or three doors open on Market Street here in Clinton. And now they're all open and we just got lucky. You know the town participated in the helping by advertising up on interstate and so forth what was down there on Market Street. What happened in Oak Ridge, that's very, very complicated.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure.
MR. SHATTUCK: When the Glazers, I think that was their name, first developed the Oak Ridge Shopping Center it was the best of its kind in East Tennessee. Knoxville didn't have anything to compete with it really but it probably may have been a victim of its own success, I don't know because it sure didn't follow through with the modern marketing scheme.
MR. MCDANIEL: And it not being on the interstate, I mean it was kind of on its own, you know. And when excessive building and the huge expansion of West Knoxville went out west.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh yeah, Turkey Creek has really, in the close future and the close past, the development of Turkey Creek has really been difficult, but there is a tendency, and it exists in Oak Ridge too, and I’m being critical of Oak Ridge and I don't mean to be, but very progressive in its thinking but unfortunately with some of that progressivism comes to tighten attitude about development. And overzealous zoning and coding regulation can have an effect on development. The fact that they aren't near an interstate obviously had an effect. But if you remember Turkey Creek, it took those developers over ten years to get Turkey Creek approved. I mean, there was protest for every level of zoning you could think of, wetlands. Everything you could think of in terms of protest before Zoning Board and Board of Zoning Appeals and even in the courts. Those developers, it took them ten years.
MR. MCDANIEL: And that's just--
MR. SHATTUCK: Even to get approval to develop Turkey Creek and you see what it is now. It is lovely; there is no negative significant environmental impact. They preserved some wetlands over there and it's a literal cash cow.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: For the City of Knoxville and Knox County. And you know those things can hamper development that should and could occur.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right, exactly. That could occurred, could have occurred in Oak Ridge perhaps.
MR. SHATTUCK: And another issue. Because, I’ve been involved in industrial developments since the late ‘60’s, but everybody says we want industry but we want high-tech, high paying jobs. Well, that is not a good overview. Number one, all industry today is high-tech. Our former county executive, Dave Bolling said a wheelbarrow factory is high-tech.
MR. MCDANIEL: It is.
MR. SHATTUCK: It better be or it's not going to be in business for very long. And that's true.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know laser cutting and you know design and robotics and all that.
MR. SHATTUCK: And everything's got to be high-tech today. I mean the distribution center, the Food Lion is high-tech. I mean you just go on and on through industries you name them and you say well that's not high-tech. Well--
MR. MCDANIEL: It has to be.
MR. SHATTUCK: It's got to be to compete. The idea of, well it just pays minimum wage jobs, well not true. All the industries that we've recruited in Anderson County pay more than minimum wage. But look at it this way. For an economy in a society to be truly viable in my opinion at least, you've got to have all those jobs. You've got to have jobs at and near minimum wage and --
MR. MCDANIEL: On up.
MR. SHATTUCK: How do you climb the economic ladder if the first two rungs are not there? You can't get started. This was, Oak Ridge has really worked very hard to attract some private industry and it’s difficult because, let’s face it. All these forty-five industries we located out here in Anderson County, fantastic, wonderful, it increased our tax base, about a hundred percent in ten years. In the meantime, Oak Ridge was working on federal projects. The Breeder Reactor didn't quite go. The Centrifuge didn't quite go. AVLIS didn't quite go. And the Spallation Neutron, it went over four billion dollars of investment, which is much more than all forty-five of our industries out here put together, you see. So Oak Ridge was doing it right in terms of continuing to look for these big projects.
MR. MCDANIEL: They kind of had their eggs in one big basket though sometimes.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, I know, but they think about that and the SNS. The potential for the betterment of mankind is almost infinite. So their effort to try to recruit private industry is great and I applaud it but it's difficult and it's hampered a little bit by--
MR. MCDANIEL: Who they are.
MR. SHATTUCK: This preconceived attitude of high-tech. I was speaking with one group and they said why is Anderson County attracting so many industries, and Oak Ridge can't attract private industry? Well, I said, well, number one, Oak Ridge is in a different kind of business and should be. But number two, let me ask you this; what if Clayton Homes had wanted to open a plant in Oak Ridge? Oh, I don't think they'd want that. And I said do you know why, well it doesn't pay enough and isn't high-tech. And I said stop, Clayton Homes starts their beginning laborers at higher wage than Boeing which had a plant there in Oak Ridge. Plus that man that was just starting, if his crew meets a quota, he gets a bonus. So the pay is just as good and the high-tech is there.
MR. MCDANIEL: It's the perception.
MR. SHATTUCK: That's right. People draw quick perceptions. People still today, you say industry and they think Pittsburgh in the 1930’s and it's just not the way it is. But that perception is there. It is really difficult to convince people otherwise sometimes, but believe me; Oak Ridge has done more to broaden everybody's outlook than it has in narrowing it.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure. What, looking towards the future for Anderson County, I mean what would you like to see? What do you think is, is feasible and obtainable.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, feasible and obtainable is continuing to provide the quality of life that we've provided the last sixty years. Oak Ridge, I will, think will continue to be on the cutting edge of projects that have national and even international impact. I mean, the impact of SNS is hard to overestimate also. It's a beautiful area and people want to come here, we've probably been blessed in not having a population explosion. I mean the population in 1950 was probably about sixty-thousand and in '60 about sixty-thousand in '70 it had grown about sixty-five thousand. '80 it might have been seventy, but the population growth has been relatively modest.
MR. MCDANIEL: So there is room for everybody.
MR. SHATTUCK: You're right; there is room for everybody and with this modest growth of population. We've had a tremendous growth in the tax base. Well, that's the best of both worlds. You know you still have space, you still have amenities, and you have a tax base to support public services. You're living in a county that has three or four of the best museums in the world.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: You’re living in a county that has Norris Lake and Norris Dam. You're living in a county that has Oak Ridge on a cutting edge of so many different things. Some of which we don't even know yet. It's an exciting place to live now just as it has been for the past fifty or sixty years. And of course, I'm an old coot now and they may not sound very inspirational to want more of the same but more of the same--
MR. MCDANIEL: Is a good thing.
MR. SHATTUCK: It's not the same because in this modern age, more of the same, and I’m talking about responsible progressive development, is in a totally different context now than it was in the ‘60’s or ‘70’s. So more of the same given the modern improvements that exist and are an intricate part of any development now.
MR. MCDANIEL: Talk a little bit about, you know the quality of life and the-- excuse me, the culture of Anderson County. I know you've touched on that a little bit but you know over the years what has, what has made it such a good quality of life. And of the place where people would want to raise a family.
MR. SHATTUCK: Well, of course we are blessed with beautiful area. Rivers, mountains, lakes. We've been blessed with tremendous natural resources. I mean the 19th century you had the coal and the lumber off the mountains. You had good farm land here in the county. We had Norris Dam and Norris Lake. We had the Manhattan Project and its contributions and all the contributions we've talked about earlier about Oak Ridge. It's amazing that socially and culturally we have stayed in a pretty stable, but yet progressive mode.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure.
MR. SHATTUCK: So, you've got to have the stability and you've got to have the progress.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right.
MR. SHATTUCK: They go together and with that stability the progress ends up being much more beneficial to many, many more people.
MR. MCDANIEL: And as communities change, which they all do over the years. It seems like Anderson County hasn't changed that much as far as quality of life issues go. I mean, they've improved but they've not, whereas you look at a place like Detroit, you know? That lost industry that you can't live there anymore, it's too dangerous, you know almost. So, I guess Anderson County has had a little bit, has seen has always had a little bit of a, I don't want to say, a crime issue, which they've not, but I guess every community has got something. But it's not, it's always been, in my opinion and this is your interview, has always been kind of small, a small part of what the life is.
MR. SHATTUCK: Every crime issue in the county has been very manageable in my opinion. But when we talk about quality of life, yes, we had it then and we have it now, but you know, quality of life now includes so much more in terms of transportation and communications and modern conveniences. That quality of life is just much, much broader now than it ever was before. And perhaps some of it to old codgers like us may be counterproductive too.
MR. MCDANIEL: I understand.
MR. SHATTUCK: That's not for me judge at this point, but it's, I guess, it's that combination of stability and dynamism that exists here in this county.
MR. MCDANIEL: Right.
MR. SHATTUCK: And it certainly has since the '30's at least. And probably before that actually. This county was the number one coal producing county in the state of Tennessee.
MR. MCDANIEL: I was going to ask you about that. Talk a little bit about the coal.
MR. SHATTUCK: Oh, well, of course.
MR. MCDANIEL: The northern part of the county.
MR. SHATTUCK: Its number one since about 1880s it's been the number one coal producing county in the state or it was up until about the ‘80's. The Windrock Mine down on near Oliver Springs. There is a lady from Oak Ridge that wrote a book called "Circling Windrock Mountain". And incidentally, that's the lady from Oak Ridge who came in here from, I don't know where, but she saw something interesting and I'd recommend that book to anybody. Because she went out there in the boonies and interviewed all the folks and really got the low down on social, cultural, economic life of Windrock Mountain and its environs. It said they sold the first television in Anderson County at the company store at Windrock.
MR. MCDANIEL: Is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: They didn't have TV in Knoxville then, but up on Windrock Mountain they could get antenna as clear as a bell.
MR. MCDANIEL: I had no idea.
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah that's a fact. And that mine was owned by Bessemer out of Birmingham and all their coal went to their steel mills in Birmingham and somebody said, I don't, I can't verify this, but there are over twelve hundred shafts under that mountain. I can't verify that, but you know the coal has been a tremendous part of this county’s history. Not only being the largest producer, but you have heard of the Coal Creek Wars. It started in Briceville and lead to the abolishment of the convict labor system in Tennessee and the abolishment of the convict labor system nationwide. In about a two to four year period. Unfortunately the largest mine disaster up to its time occurred in Fraterville in 1902, or somewhere like that.
MR. MCDANIEL: 1902. Yes.
MR. SHATTUCK: But along with that there has been tremendous timber that came off that and along with all that coal and timber production you had a lot of fortunes made. And some of those fortunes where invested in Oliver Springs. It was a tourist mecca.
MR. MCDANIEL: Oh, is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: For 1895 to about 1905 they had those magnificent old Victorian hotels down there. People came from all over the eastern United States to Oliver Springs to take the springs and you know soak in the water, drink the water. And hotels were magnificent with a marble fireplace in each room and grand piano in each room.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know, I just did a documentary on the history of Grainger County, and part of that was Tate Springs, which was the same type of resort.
MR. SHATTUCK: Red Boling Springs out in Middle Tennessee. Beersheba Springs around southwest. But Oliver Springs was one of the jewels in that sequence.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure.
MR. SHATTUCK: But that's had a tremendous effect. You know the irony, that coal; I'd say more than any county in the state; in the coal production through the '50's, '60's, and the '70's because it was deep mines and then they started the strip mining and then the equipment got better and they could go back and strip mine coal they wouldn't have tried earlier. And kept on and on and lead to a lot of environmental issues also.
MR. MCDANIEL: Sure exactly.
MR. SHATTUCK: But that's been an interesting history to follow.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know it, I’m sure it has been. Thinking about the energy, specifically, you had Norris Dam in the 1930’s, late '30’s.
MR. SHATTUCK: But stop to think about this. I'm interrupting you. Largest coal producing county in the state for all those decades. The first, therefore the largest, hydroelectric producer in the state. Then you have atomic power at Oak Ridge, first, you have wind turbines down there at Windrock now. And now you know that we're the largest natural gas producer in the state of Tennessee.
MR. MCDANIEL: Is that right?
MR. SHATTUCK: Yeah, Yeah.
MR. MCDANIEL: So Anderson County--
MR. SHATTUCK: Energy has always been an integral part of this county's history.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: But that energy--
MR. MCDANIEL: Not only producing it but in consuming it with Oak Ridge.
MR. SHATTUCK: Exactly.
MR. MCDANIEL: You know during the Manhattan Project, you know.
MR. SHATTUCK: Do you know that one statistic that I still just can't believe? That the Manhattan Project consumed one-seventh of all the electricity generated in America.
MR. MCDANIEL: Absolutely.
MR. SHATTUCK: I mean. That’s unbelievable.
MR. MCDANIEL: That's what I mean, it was incredible. It was incredible.
MR. SHATTUCK: The history of this county, it's amazing a county this size and the history it's had through these decades is amazing really. Fascinating and unique and puts us way ahead a lot of counties much larger than we are, in terms of that history.
MR. MCDANIEL: Well, is there anything else you want to talk about?
MR. SHATTUCK: No, just I’m very impressed with what Oak Ridge has meant to this county and to this nation and to the world.
[END OF INTERVIEW]